YMLS

SAN FRANCISCO -- Saul Klein, president and CEO for Internet Crusade, an Internet publishing company that offers online services for real estate professionals, noted that people often ponder what the nation's multiple listing services will be like in the future. Another important question, he said, is "Why MLS?" It may help to identify and justify which components of the MLS are vital, he said.

"Maybe the future of the MLS is a single point of entry for data. The offer of compensation -- is that as important in the future? I'm not so sure," he said. Klein spoke Thursday during an MLS panel at the Real Estate Connect SF conference. "The world's changing and the real estate world's changing," he also said.

Several MLS sessions at the real estate conference seemed to uproot more questions than answers -- there are many different approaches to reforming the MLS system, including data sharing, creating a massive property database, and the consolidation of several MLSs into a larger regional MLS. Progress won't be easy. There are hundreds of MLSs across the country, and politics, differing geographies and differences of opinion loom among the massive barriers to meaningful change, some conference panelists suggested.

The National Association of Realtors is investigating whether to establish a national real estate data repository that would include volumes of information for all types of properties in the country, including residential and commercial properties and vacant land. Such a system could be a cautious first step toward unifying MLSs.

The California Association of Realtors is studying whether to form a large unified MLS or establish a giant database of property information for Realtors in the state. And there are already examples of regional and statewide data-sharing and consolidation efforts across the country.

And this week, 10 MLSs in California announced a massive data-sharing agreement called the California MLSAlliance that will provide 150,000 agents in the state with access to information for about 2.5 million active listings and off-market properties in the state.

Brendan King, chief operating officer for online marketing company Point2 Technologies, Inc., said during an MLS panel, "The control of data really isn't what Realtors bring as the value proposition to the consumer," as property information is already widely available to the public on the Internet, and MLSs likely do not have a future "with respect to the marketing and advertising proposition."

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